While there are still obvious questions about how powerful the WiiU actually is and whether third party support is going to follow the same pattern as it did on Wii, the social Miiverse stuff looks like a pretty big game changer, especially if Nintendo gave up friend codes as a limitation to who you can communicate with (which it looks like maybe they have).

I am really looking forward to seeing what the Wii U can do. I have such a soft spot/blind spot for Nintendo, it's hard to be critical. I don't know that the Wii U will be mind-blowing, but if the worst thing that happens is that I get a new Mario, Zelda, and Metroid, I think it'll be fine. Also, I know everyone's waiting for news of the next Zelda, Metroid, Starfox, or whatever, but there's only one Nintendo franchise for me: MARIO KART!

Some games I'm looking forward to:

Sleeping Dogs: Selfishly, because I did some ambient scriptwriting for it, and I'm curious to see if anything made it into the final game. I worked on it during the Activision phase, and not sure what, if anything changed when Square-Enix took over. But, it just looks awesome, and a lot of my friends at United Front Games worked their ass off on it, so I want it to do well for them.

Ni No Kuni: Because I love the idea of a Studio Ghibli-designed Pokemon/Final Fantasy mashup.

Assassin's Creed 3: Love the American Revolution setting to this one, and I love that the lead character is a bit ethnic, as opposed to generic tough white guy. Bonus diversity points to Ubisoft if the rumours of a Vita spin-off featuring a female assassin as a lead turn out to be true.

Looking forward to learning more this week. Was just thinking to myself that I'd probably buy myself a new system in the fall, so I'm hoping to hear what the Wii U can offer, otherwise I'll have to choose between PS Vita, 3DS , and 360.

Even if the WiiU flops and is the worst console ever made, I support it because it is going to force Sony, Microsoft, and whoever else wants to throw their hat in to the ring this cycle to get off their asses and release a new console. This has been the longest console release gap (as far as I know), and it is really starting to negatively affect the development of video games. If a new XBox was released tomorrow, the effect of this gap would still be felt for at least a year. The current gen of consoles is now 7 years old, running what was middling hardware (at best) from seven years ago. Developing for that sort of environment is crippling what games can do, and may have some part in explaining why AAA games feel largely the same - too much time is spent on the technical side, and not enough on the actual game dev side.

@Morac - the economy is whats stopping a new release right now to be honest. The PS3 launched ar $600 remember, and to do so again would be suicide for them at the moment as people simply won't drop that amount of cash on one right now.

The next round of consoles will still be 'middling' compared to what the PC does, because they need to think of costs and price far more.

I suspect an extra year will be the difference between everyone looking at them and going 'meh, my PC can do that already' and 'actually, that's probably worth it'.

With the market as it is, shifts towards mobile and internet gaming and so on, releasing any console right now is far more of a gamble than it's been for some years now. It seems to me both Sony and Microsoft are waiting for the other to blink first...

"This enemy player backed out of the middle of the match and sent me a voice message," Haniver says, remembering her worst experience. He said he hoped she would be raped and she and her family killed.

@Jay Kay - something bothers me about taking a horror game like Dead Space and introducing co-op play. It just becomes 'yet another shooter', the video looks to be nothing much beyond, say, Gears of War now.

@Vornaskotti - I saw that article yesterday and, unfortunately, nothing in it surprised me in the slightest. Yes, a lot of it has to do with inarticulate 12-17 year old boys playing games rated M/18 etc and being sexually aggressive and misogynistic because they can get away with it, or because they think they're being funny and cool when they say they're going to rape a female player/gamer. But why the hell wasn't that guy kicked out of the Cross Assault tournament and given a life ban immediately? If an adult is saying these things, they definitely know that the way they're behaving is wrong on multiple levels. The fact that Microsoft (in particular, but not alone) also doesn't appear to do anything, ever, when this type of behaviour is reported just gives the impression that they don't really care about the in-game experience of their female gamers. It's certainly not a new problem, but the fact it's still not being addressed head-on is a major issue itself. /rantends

On a completely different note, the PS3 game, Sorcery, is being advertised rather heavily over here in the UK. Am I the only person amazed that something with graphics that appear to be on the same level as those used in, Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver 2, is being pushed this hard? Bearing in mind that LoK: SR2 came out over ten years ago (depressing, huh?) I'm beginning to question the future of console games if this is what Sony consider to be a worthwhile, 'exclusive'. Sure, it's using the, Playstation Move, but since when did motion sensor gimmickry become more important than the actual visuals? Games are, after all, still a heavily visual medium. If inserting the latest gimmick/platform/controller takes up enough of the production budget to affect the main budget for the visuals, is it worth it? Sure, I get to wave around a wand and be a part of the action. But, in a recession, do I want to waste my money on a game like this when I can just break out my PS2 and play an eleven year old game with a similar level of graphics, without having to contend with connection issues and glitches?

As someone who got ridiculously excited over the PS3's graphic capabilities before its launch was delayed the first time, the answer is, no.

@DistractDelude - The chap in Cross Assault wasn't a player in the tournament, he was one of the coaches hired to coach the people playing. I agree Capcom should've dealt with it better, but I got the feeling the guys running it were trying to keep a lid on it instead of doing something properly, because it was 'just a web show for the fans' rather than something more public.